When I talked to Nelson Makua recently, he told me that his job is to be the “other side of the brain.”

Nelson has a full-service design company, and he’s the one who designed that great Hamakua Springs logo. He’s known Richard for years, having designed the Kea‘au Bananas logo way back when.

“What I offer clients is an objective view from the outside,” he said, “to give a fresh perspective of how they’re being perceived by the clients. The other half is to take that information and make it into something visually, to address whatever we’re trying to achieve.” The art work, he explained, is pretty much the last leg of the job.

He said that when Richard told him he was starting up Hamakua Springs, he went out to Pepe‘ekeo to see the farm for himself.

“When I got there he showed me some springs,” he told me. “His farm had access to fresh water springs just coming out of the grounds. That was basically the take-off point for the image. I was looking for something that visually dictated the water element, as well as the mountains and valley of the Hamakua coast.”

He found it.

Later, when Richard told Nelson he was going to start growing products hydroponically, and produce a “living product,” Nelson said he knew it wouldn’t be enough to just tell people that.

“I’m a visualist and my problem was the words weren’t strong enough, clear enough,” he said. “So I designed a little logo that would appear on all the products that are living. Something that would distinguish him from other companies.”

As for the hydroponics, he called it “Hawaiian Hydroponics,” to give it a geographic sense. Nelson explained that as a visual pun, there’s a drop of water replacing the first “o” in “hydroponic.”

Nelson has worked in the business for almost 30 years, specializing in image development and logo design.

He explained that image development is looking at the products, figuring out who the market is and working out visuals based on that.

Logo design—well, you know what that is:

Nelson’s good, obviously, at what he does, and his resume proves it. He’s worked with Big Island Candies for 20 years and Mauna Loa Macadamia Nuts for 10, as well as for Chinese New Year, the Hawaiian Slack Key Festival, Tahiti Fete of both Hilo and San Jose and others.

His work has been nominated three times for Hoku Hanohano awards (for three of the 27 album designs he’s done for Hawaiian Slack Key Masters) and won for graphic design twice. For four years now he’s designed the beautiful Merrie Monarch hula posters.

He displays his clothing line at the retail store “Na Makua” (http://www.namakua.com), on Waianuenue Avenue in downtown Hilo, which he operates with his son Kainoa. His new designs come out there in August, if you want to go see.

It’s always worth the trip.

–Leslie Lang, chief blogger